Simple? Not Quite
by The-Shy-Quiet-One
Summary: What happens when a strange shows up on the Dursley's doorstep in the summer of 1996? From summer to school, things for Harry Potter are not always what they seem. AN: An older story I've revamped.
1. Odd Occurences

Disclaimer: All hail JK Rowling.

This is an older story that I had up that I've decided to revamp, make chapters longer, ect. I have not done too much editing though, so it's still the same story. I am going to continue it., it's just taken me a while to do so. I apologise for any formatting issues because the original was written in wordpad. I have tried to fix them.

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><p><strong>Simple? Not Quite<strong>.

_Chapter One: Odd Occurences_

A mop of shaggy, unruly jet black hair hung from the head of a bespectacled sixteen year old, skinny, over sized cloth wearing, boy known as the 'Boy-Who-Lived', and more currently 'The-Chosen-One.' A sigh escaped his mouth as his bright emerald green, almond shaped eyes stared boredly, yet fervently at the ceiling of the smallest bedroom in the house known as Number Four, Privet Drive. It was summer, mid-July to be exact. So, why wasn't this boy outside in the sunshine, walking around, or doing chores like his Aunt Petunia made him usually? Well, so far, he'd spent most of the summer in the very position he was in now, laying in the dark, head hanging off the side of his bed, staring at either the ceiling or out the window, legs stretching acrossed and hanging down at his knees on the other side of the bed. Though it looked like he was being lazy, he was actually in a rather depressed state of mind. Guilt, heartache, un-fallen tears, and the great feeling of loss of something in the very pit of his heart raged within him. The lose of his godfather, Sirius Black had hit him hard like a sack of nails... without the sack.

_'S'all my fault... If I hadn't.. If I'd've listened to Hermione... If only I...' _He held back the tears for about the thousandth time that week alone... and it was only Tuesday. Despite his trying, one slipped, but he quickly wiped it away, and sighing, sat up. His Aunt Petunia was calling him down for lunch. He obeyed reluctantly, having refused to eat anything since breakfast the day before. On his way out of his room, the doorbell could be heard ringing and he stopped dead, watching from the upstairs landing above._ 'Probably_ _another one of Dudley's stupid friends.' _He was proved wrong though, as his aunt opened the door. Instead, standing in the doorway, was a girl.

She was extremely disheveled, though she was also a very pretty little thing if one took the time to be disinterested in that little detail. She was dripping wet and shivering, clad only in a couple of towels. An old ratty, dirty , green one wrapped around her from her chest to halfway down to her knees whilst an even raggier, holey, worn out old blue one was wrapped about her shoulders and head like a shawl. Both were soaked through and dripped down around her bare feet. It was no wonder with the huge storm going on outside... it'd been like that all summer, sudden thunderstorms, rain showers, and once there'd even been hail.

Harry leaned forward on the banister, just a bit, but keeping himself hidden around the corner, behind the wall at the same time, trying to figure out what color hair and eyes she had, though it was impossible when her hair was pretty much completely hidden beneath her towel, and she was too far away for her eyes to be distinguishable. He watched her closely as he let out a shiver and huddled her towels about her just a tad tighter before speaking.

"P-p-please m-m-ma'am... I.. I... I was just w-wondering if... I could possibly stand on your b-b-back porch until th-this s-s-storm blows over? It would mean a lot to me... I.. I could do chores later on... in.. in o-order, t-t-to pay y-you back." The girl gulped, still shivering in what now seemed to be an uncontrollable way. Harry waited, positively sure the girl was going to get yelled at and sent away, never to be seen again, but once again, he was wrong. He watched with shock as his aunt's face softened with a look he had never seen her use before, concern and pity.

"Oh dear! No, no, no! You can come right inside, forget the porch. You just come right on in and we'll get you cleaned up, dried off, and warm. The girl was looking just as shocked as Harry felt.

"I... I couldn't possibly intrude..." The girl stuttered out again, her voice full of fear, hope, chatting teeth, and a delicate softness . It was a very sweet, and pleasant noise if a certain boy of our's did say so himself.

"Oh, it's no problem." Aunt Petunia put a hand on the girl's shoulder and led her inside, closing the door behind her. She then beckoned her upstairs, Harry quickly retreating into his room before he was spotted. He lay down on the floor on his back, listening through the four-year-old cat flap in his door.

"Now you just take a nice warm shower and get cleaned up, you're positively filthy. I'll be back in half hour to check up on you. Water was turned on, there were more footsteps, very familiar as his aunt's, and a door shutting, muffling out the sound of the water.

Harry felt his door open, but he didn't move in time. The cat flap when up and over his head, giving him a very awkward position. He looked up at Aunt Petunia, avoiding the fact that if he tilted his eyes ever so slightly he'd have a good shot of staring up her skirt and that was just something he didn't want to do. His aunt jumped at the sight of his head, with a slight gasp before glaring down at him.

"Boy." She whispered menacingly. "I swear, I will slay you alive!" Harry, ignoring the comment continued to stare back from his rather odd position on the floor. He was used to those kind of threats by now.

"Who is she?" The question left his mouth before he could stop himself.

"None of your business is who she is! Now get downstairs and eat your lunch before she's finished! I don't want you to speak to her when you're around her, which won't be very often, understood?"

"Yes Aunt Petunia." Harry sighed and slide on his back, pulling his head out of the cat flap. He rose from the floor and left his room as his aunt entered her and her husband's. He heard her rummaging around for something before he ran down the stairs, taking them three at a time and hurried into the kitchen. He gulped down the pathetic lump of cheese between two slices of bread, and downed a glass of milk without even sitting down at the table to do so. He then ran back up to his room, closing his door behind him and resuming his earlier position on his bed. Questions were now running through his mind like a wild fire. Who was this odd girl? Where had she come from? What was she doing here? Was she a with, or a Muggle? Was she in the league with Voldemort, having set some kind of charm on his aunt to get into the house? Had Voldemort sent her to watch him? Or, was she part of the Order? Had his headmaster sent her to keep an eye on him inconspicuously? It was all so very confusing.. and yet intriguing at the same time.

….

It wasn't too much later that we find the hero of our story still lying on his bed, his mind still running over about a million questions he wondered about the strange girl whom had arrived where he had lived for so any years and currently only spent the summers at. Upon the sound of the bathroom door opening though, he shot bolt upright, rolling off his bed to listen at the cat flap in his door as he had been doing earlier. What he heard next was possibly the sweetest sound he could imagine; a soft, sweet, and nervous sounding voice.

"Ma'am?" Footsteps sounding, coming up the stairs and down the hallway to the bathroom directly acrossed from Harry's bedroom. They were the very familiar footsteps of his Aunt Petunia, her voice following after them almost immediately

"Are you done dear?"

"Yes... but… I…"

"No worries dear. Just come along, that's right, just right on in here." The footsteps went along and a door closed, most likely the one leading into Vernon and Petunia's bedroom by the sound of it's creaking.

Harry sighed and laid there in silence for quite a bit. He heard the two leave the bedroom and head downstairs after a good half an hour of hearing nothing, but he stayed put so as not to upset his aunt and uncle as he was known to do so many times in his life so far. He would have much rather stayed right where he was had it been any normal day, but it wasn't. There was a strange girl down there that could have been sent by Voldemort, or the Order, or she could have just been a plain Muggle girl.

The storm that had been horrendous earlier seemed to have decided it was through with this town of nearly identical houses and their prissy owners. Birds were now chirping, raindrops were leaking off the edges off roofs, people were coming out of their houses the enjoy the sun before it rained again, and still Harry stayed put. He sat there for a long time, just pondering and staring at the ceiling with a rather blank look on his face. Uncle Vernon came home, Dudley could be heard in the room next to the bathroom fooling around with his punching bag, and the smells of supper wafted through the entire house, tempting everyone's stomachs to growl hungrily.

"Suppertime!" Aunt Petunia yelled from the kitchen. Dudley raced (as well at a big fat tub of large can run) down the stairs at the sheer mention of food, his feet pounding noisily. Harry rose from his bed and followed him, stopping at the top of the stairs to see whether he was welcome or not. Needless to say he was feeling exceptionally hungry right about now (or curious about a little someone), and he wanted to eat. He stared questioningly down at his Aunt who sighed and nodded.

"Yes, you too boy. We're eating out in the garden. I don't want any funny business understood? Behave yourself. Now hurry up, everyone else is already at the table." Even though her voice was as strict as it always was when she spoke to him, Harry was used to it. He made his way down stairs, taking the steps two at a time and skipping the last three as he did when he was told to be quick. He made his way through the kitchen and the greenhouse room connected to it, heading out onto the garden patio where the picnic table was set up.

Uncle Vernon had seated himself on one of the short benches at the end of the table, Aunt Petunia sat acrossed from him, speaking to Dudley about something, though the fat boy just kept shaking his head and refusing his mother's please. Dudley was taking up one whole side of the table, having placed himself in the center of the long bench so there wasn't enough space for another human being to sit on either side of him and eat comfortably without getting knocked into. The girl from earlier was seated on the bench acrossed from Dudley's, hardly taking up any space at all, her lips unmoving as she stayed silent, nodding her head politely as she listened to Uncle Vernon drone on about his drill business, Grunnings.

She was clean a tidy now, her ebony black hair brushed out thoroughly and plaited to a point. It reminded Harry of a girl from a book he had to read back in his third year of grade school, The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funke. The girl now wore a pale green spaghetti strap tank top that stated in purple glittery fabric paint that she was 'Sweet as a cookie when pleased. Best to run away from when angered.' It was definitely something that looked as though the shirt had been bought blank and then written on. Beneath this shirt the girl wore a darker green skirt the looked extremely light and foofy, the kind that goes upwards when one spins around in it and doesn't have a zipper or any sort, just elastic. The girl's feet where just about the smallest one's Harry'd ever seen before. They were clad in a simple pair of green, rainbow polka dotted flip-flops.

When Harry sat down beside her on the bench and as far away as possible so not to upset anyone, she looked over at him with a very sweet smile. Her eyes were a shining deep sapphire blue, a color he only knew existed in a deep velvety blue, star filled nighttime Hogwarts' sky. He stared at her, eyes wide, mouth slightly agape. At this her shoulders shrugged up and she lets out a small single giggle before speaking. "Hi."

Her smile, giggle, and single word were all so cute that Harry could do nothing but give her a silly lopsided grin back, unable to manage anything else. He then tried to turn away before his aunt or uncle could see, but he just couldn't bring himself to take his eyes off her's. They were such an odd color it was mesmerizing.

"Boy!" Aunt Petunia's sharp voice broke Harry's state of being just about hypnotized. He jumped in shock and look at her as innocently as he could manage. "I believe our guest has told you hello. Be polite and reply to her." Harry blinked and then started mouthing soundlessly, unable to get a single word out causing his aunt to sigh with frustration.

"You'll have to excuse him dear, he's just not quite right in the mind you know." This statement received an amused snort out of Dudley who was currently stuffing his face with a hot dog.

"Potter's retardedly thick alright. A real nutter! He goes around thinking he can cast spells with a stick." His parent's froze at this, staring at him as though they were ready to lash out for his stupidity, but Dudley continued. "His parents were stupid too. They got drunk and crashed their car. That's why Potter's got that big ugly scar on his forehead; it screwed up his brains too. That's why he's such a stupid freak." His father looked ready to say something, but was cut off by the abruptness of Harry rising up. He was fed up with the teasing and bullying of his cousin. The bench flew backwards and he glared at the fat boy with the utmost loathing.

"You know perfectly well that I can! I could turn all of you…" He point at the Dursley's. "… into mice if I tried hard enough and wanted too! I'm not daft!" He tugged his wand out of his waistband, the place where he always kept it when wearing Muggle attire. "If any of you ever say otherwise again… I shall curse you all into oblivion! I've come face to face with Voldemort four times! Each time he's tried to do me in! First as a baby, then with the Sorcerer's Stone! Then with the baskalisk! Then in a graveyard where I watched him kill Cedric! And then last June! His followers hurt five of my friends! The two hurt the worst were and still are my greatest friends! Then one of his followers went and killed Sirius! She killed him! Then…. Now…. You. Can't tell me I'm not what I am!" He stopped shouting, breathing heavily, red in the face. He turned and marched right on out the back gate, his temper boiling mad.

Harry walked as he had done the past summer, letting his feet guide him. Only this time there were tears threatening to fall at the very thought of his lost beloved godfather. He soon found himself in the par, sitting down on the last remaining swing whose chain's hadn't been twisted horridly or broken by Dudley's gang. He wrapped both arms around the chains, reaching up to hold them as well, his toes making the swing go back and forth in a very slow, low, steady motion. To say he was very upset would be an understatement.

After a few minutes of just sitting there, he began calling out, knowing that one of the Order members would most certainly be watching him. They always had at least one of them following him about still, just in case something happened.

"Mrs. Weasley? Mr. Weasley?" Naturally he called for those he'd rather come first, the one's he knew the best and longest. "Lupin? Tonks? Moody? Kingsley? Mc-…" He was cut off by a very familiar voice.

"I'm here Harry. What is it dear?" He turned to find Mrs. Weasley untangling herself from among a bunch of bushes just acrossed the playground area of the park and felt a surge of thankful relief.

"I… I…" _No, I refuse to cry. I'm not going to cry like some little weak boy. No, I won't I… bugger, too late._ He gave up trying not too, and let a few desperately needed tears fall. He rose from the swing and just about ran to his best friend's mother. She wrapped him up with her arms in one of those bone crushing, motherly hugs he had come to love so much. Once she did so he allowed himself to cry just a little bit harder, the empty space in his heart where Sirius had been aching in an awful sort of way. He felt a hand reach up and smooth his hair back as though it had done this many, many times before. Naturally, with seven children of her own, Mr. Weasley had to be good at this sort of thing by now.

"Shhh dear, it's alright. I'm right here, calm down."

"I…I just can't take it anymore." Harry states, blinking his eyes as the tears stopped flowing. He stepped back and rubbed at his face with the sleeve of his shirt, drying it. "I just blew up at them completely! Not like they didn't deserve it, but…"

"I know I saw. It's alright for you to be angry with them Harry, they're retched Muggles. But you really must learn to control your temper around innocent bystander Muggles. That poor girl went flying when you kicked over that bench. She's got some bruises on the back of her legs and a rather skinned up knee from hitting the table as well."

"I didn't mean too. I didn't know I'd… Was there blood?"

"Quite a bit dear, but she'll be fine."

"Good… I guess. D'you think you could tell…?" Harry started but Mrs. Weasley raised a hand to silence him knowingly.

"Will do. Ron and Hermione have… well, let's just say they miss you enough to attempt to come and rescue you themselves. I've had to take away their wands and contain them to their bedrooms more than once in the past week alone! Ginny too, just not so much. All of them seem to think you desperately need them to keep you from becoming suicidal after…"

"Tell them if I was suicidal I'd already be dead." Harry states with a slight smile at the thought of Ron and Hermione banging on their bedroom doors in a desperate attempt to get out of them to come and see him. He could even picture Ron flying out of his bedroom window on his broom, grabbing Hermione from her's and both of them flying off towards Little Whining, Surrey. "After what Dumbledore told me end of last year, do they really think I'd leave the entire world mortally doomed?"

"Apparently so. I'll let them know you're fine. Lupin'll be on duty in about half an hour. I best get back under cover alright. Goodbye, be careful and stay strong Harry."

"Bye Mrs. Weasley." Harry watched as she left and disappeared among the bushes once more. He was then caused to jump about a foot in the air in shock at the sudden sound of a soft, sweet voice stating clearly…

"Excuse me?"

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><p>And there you have it! I hope you enjoyed the first chapter, and that the grammar wasn't too much to bare. Please lmemme know what you thought, I love hearing from you.<p>

Hugs and love,

S.Q.O.


	2. The Girl

Disclaimer: JK Rowling is the shit.

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><p><strong><span>Simple? Not Quite.<span>**

_Chapter Two: The Girl_

Harry jumped and turned around only to be met with that pair of absolutely bloody stunning eyes. Gulping he stared at the strange girl, noting that someone had wrapped white bandaging around her left knee and there was now a line of about five little round band aids stretching down from a millimeter away from the corner of her right eye down to her chin. Feeling rather guilty, Harry shifted his feet and tore his eyes away from her's.

"Oh…. Er…."

"Your aunt said that you're to come home." The girl stated clearly, her tone extremely gentle compared to what Harry was used to from his relatives.

"Oh. Okay. Listen, I'm uh… sorry about…. With the bench and the table and everything. I didn't mean for anyone to get hurt, well at least not you. You didn't do anything wrong." Harry continued to look down and away from her, keeping his eyes on his own feet in their trainers with the rubbers peeling off. He really needed new ones. These were much too tight and one of his big toes was peeking ever so slightly through a hold in the left one.

"S'ok. You're relative don't treat you very kindly do they? I mean, with all that stuff about you being retarded… it's clear that that was just a bunch of hooey. You don't seem to have anything wrong with you?" Harry shook his head vigorously; glad she had noticed and not believed what Dudley had said.

"No. I didn't think do. Though they have been rather nice to me, so I just assumed not to say anything that might make them angry with me. Oh! And I believe you… about the whole, what would you call it? Wizard thing. It sound positively cool." The girl grinned at him, her lips forming a very sweet shape.

"You do?" Harry looked rather shockedly surprised at this. This girl didn't even know him very at all, yet her she was, believing what he said and being extremely kind as well.

"Of course! The way you just jumped up like that! You're face was so red and angry looking! Trust me, I've got the wounds to prove I believe. No one lying would have a reaction like that." The girl gestured towards her knee, staring at him, her eyes never wavering from his face. Harry smiles happily at her, happy that she was so understanding, though knowing that if the Ministry of Magic got wind of this they'd be on with Memory Charms like flies on a bug zapper, so he decided to change the subject.

"What's your name?" The girl bit her lip and looked down all of a sudden. She turned and plopped down on the swing Harry had been occupying only a few minutes before. She took up his swinging back and forth slowly, using only her toes to do so, her hands clasping the chains.

"To tell you the truth, I don't exactly remember. You see, I can't remember anything at all from before a week ago except that there was screaming and lights and loud noises everywhere. And then I remember water, lots and lots of water. It was really cold water too. Then there was a dead body of a woman… it was still warm and scared the crap outta me so I got out of there as fast as I could. I think I knew her though… and I think she was with me and I think we'd been from or to some formal thing because I had this dress on… but that completely destroyed so I took to wearing a couple towels I found in the garbage."

Harry stared down at her, at a lose for words for a moment. He really didn't know what to say at all to that. He'd known she had to be homeless when she'd turned up, but for it to be because she couldn't remember anything or whatever was just sad. "I'm sorry. You're alright though aren't you?"

"Yeah. Mostly…. What about you? Why do you live with the Dursley's? They called you Potter and you look nothing like them… and it's clear you'd rather not stay with them."

"Oh, that. My parents were murdered when I was about one by some psychopath."

"So we're both kinda sorta orphans then. At least, I dunno if I have a family or not, so, orphans it is then. It also seems neither of us is very much wanted at all."

"Yeah, well, I'm definitely not wanted around here. But you though…"

"Ha! Are you kidding? I promised your aunt I'd do all the housework she wants me too plus some since she let me in. Needless to say she jumped at that pretty quick and suggested I stay for a while. She mentioned something about that fat kid as well… like a date kind of thing with him as he seems to be having trouble getting girls lately."

"Ouch. But it figures, Dudley couldn't get a date if he tried. Since you don't have a name, how about we just pick one to call you for the time being? Calling you 'that girl' might get a bit annoying after a while."

"Oh! Good idea… um.. how about… oh dear, I suck at picking names for anything. You pick."

"Um, how about Elly?"

"Sounds much to horseish."

"Lissy?"

"Uh uh…." The girl wrinkled up her nose, shaking her head at him. Harry frowned, trying to think of something she might like.

"Daphne?"

"Nah. Sounds much too prissy." The two teenagers carried on like this for quite some time, suggesting names and turning them down with an excuse, and most of the time Harry had to agree with the excuse. After about ninety names he was beginning to tire, as well as the girl they were trying to figure out a name for. Harry was starting to run out of names, he'd even started listing names of girls from Hogwarts, had them all turned down and then started on girls from grade school. Name after name after name they went, none of them seeming right until…

"Yes! It's absolutely fantastic!"

"You like it?" Harry stared at the girl as she jumped up from the swing and spun around happily.

"Yes. Shawna…. Shawna, Shawna, Shawna." Harry sighed with relief, staring up at her happily.

"It seems to suit you doesn't it."

"I like it a lot." Shawna states happily, hopping about more so than she had been already. "We should probably head back now. The sky looks like it's going to get dark sooner.

"Yeah, we probably should. Back to the Dursley doomdum we have to live in." Harry rose from the ground. He watches as Shawna's skirt twirled about as she continued spinning about ever so happily. The entire outfit was cute and unique, but definitely simple, plain, and conservative at the same time, though Harry wasn't about to describe them that way, being a guy. "Hey, I was wondering… where'd my aunt get the clothes? I mean, they're definitely not her's, they're too much of a mixture between Hermione and Ginny to be her's at all."

"Who're Hermione and Ginny?" Shawna stopped twirling to look at him curiously.

"Two of my close friends, but that's off the subject." Harry quickly skims over the though of two of his best friends, thinking of them was just as hard as it had been back at the end of his first year when they hadn't written… well… not Ginny, but Ron and Hermione, though Ginny was getting rather close to falling into the 'best friend' category as well after that incident at the Ministry.

"Oh." Shawna twirls about for a second before grabbing the hem of the skirt and looking at it. "Your aunt took them out of a cardboard box labeled 'Lily's things.' It was way up top in the very far back corner of her closet. It was a rather large box."

Harry felt as if she'd cut off the air coming in his lungs and going to his brain for a minute. "L-l-lily's… things…. My mother." His mother's things… things that had belonged to her when she was most likely around Shawna's age. That skirt had been worn by her… and those flip flops… and that tank top had been bought and then decorated either by her or one of her friends. Hell, Shawna could've been wearing his mother's old underwear, though he wasn't about to ask about that one.

"Your mother…" Shawna stopped her bouncing and stared at him. "Oh Harry I… I could wear something else if you… if you want me too… "

"No! I mean… Mum would want you too. I don't think she'd appreciated your wearing those towels when her old clothes fit you perfectly well." _And look rather good on her too. _

"Oh. Well then I guess I'll just keep wearing the things in the box then. It's chock full of things"

"I'd like that." Harry smiled as her cheeks lit up with redness and she looked down, her fingers clinging to the hem of the skirt she wore. "Let's go. The Dursleys'll kill us if we don't get back soon."

"Right." And so the two teenagers headed back to Number Four Privet Drive, both feeling a little happier than they had been earlier before they had started talking. Harry was glad he seemed to have at last found a friend in this crazy Muggle world he had to live in for a month every summer. He jus hoped the Dursleys didn't tear them apart or something like that.

….

"Are you positively sure?" Albus Dumbledore asked ever so seriously. Upon her arrival bag at the Order of the Phoenix Headquarters, Mrs. Weasley had recounted everything that had happened during her time as Harry-baby-sitter-slash-stalker-type. She'd retold the Order every little detail they needed to know, especially about the strange girl's sudden arrival at number four and her befriending of their Boy-Who-Lived.

"Positive Albus. The girl is definitely staying with the Dursleys. She appeared this morning during that awful storm they had. She seems like such a nice girl, but she could very well be a Death Eater in disguise." Mrs. Weasley nodded in response to the great bearded one's question.

"Did Harry mention, or did you notice him being in pain in any way, most likely in the scar region, while around this girl?"

"No, in fact, I haven't seen him happier all summer than when I left him. He usually just keeps to himself in his bedroom or roams about the neighborhood as though he's got nothing better to do, you all know that. But he was actually smiling for once today."

"Just as I thought." Dumbledore smiled ever so slightly, his blue eyes twinkling. "It is about time, I think, for me to reveal to you yet another prophecy that our dear boy is involved in."

"Another? Does it say how he'll defeat You-Know-Who?" Mr. Weasley persisted; the other members all leaned intently forward towards Dumbledore, wanting to hear this one.

Not exactly, but…"

"Get on with it man! We're all on the edges of our seats!" A rather impatient Tonks pressured, her voice rather anxious sounding.

"Very well the." Dumbledore cleared his throat and began. "Many years ago… many, many years ago Hogwarts had a different Divination teacher… a true Seer who was known throughout the world as the great Professor Mark Definator predicted it when I was having tea with him. It was a very chilly winter day… December 12th 1904 if memory proves correct."

"Yes, but what does it say!" Tonks seemed ready to start strangling the old man if he didn't spill the beans in the next thirty seconds. Needless to say she was very much stress lately and pushing her buttons wasn't a very good thing to be doing at the moment.

"Alright, alright, calm down Nymphadora." Dumbledore smiled and waves his arms, his Pensieve appearing on the center of the table before them all. He summoned up the memory of a rather old looking man holding a cup of steaming tea. Suddenly his eyes blanked and the cup dropped, breaking and spilling once it hit the floor.

"The one to heal his sorrow shall appear along with rain, thunder and lightening, clad from head to knee in rags. They are neither man nor woman nor completely child. The Chosen One shall trust in this being, so very much like himself in so many ways. He shall grow stronger, happier, more powerful. He shall have the power to defeat _Him_." The little man turns into swirling dust and returned into the Pensieve. Dumbledore looked around at the expressions on the faces of the Order.

"I wasn't sure who HIM was until after Syblle Trelawney's prophecy was made. Though, I am sure that this girl whom you speak of is far from being a foe of our's."

Very much unknown to the adults down in the basement kitchen, there was an extremely long Extendable Ear taped above the door to the room, stretching up and along the ceiling, making it's way from there to the second floor where it then trail along the very edge of the floor, under the crack beneath a door, along the center of a floor and then up and onto a four poster bed where it split into three separate pieces, each going into three different ears, none the same as the other. The entire contraption blended right on in with every background it was set against.

"Blimey!" stated Ron with a gasp. "Harry definitely seems to have made a new friend, hasn't he?"

"Shush Ron! They're speaking again." Hermione smacked him upside the head. As much as she disapproved of spying, it was she who had placed the Disillusionment Charm upon the overly large Extendable ear that Ginny had cunningly swiped from Fred and George's back room of their shop. Not that the twins minded, they always let her stock up on as many pranks as she wanted, who better to try and become Hogwarts' new Pranksters in Chief than their own kin? Ron however only got a ten percent discount like the rest of the Hogwarts students.

Back down to the kitchen basement where the meeting was still taking place…

"Odder than this girl's sudden appearance is that Harry blew up at the Dursleys in front of her about certain things. She _knows_." Mrs. Weasley states as though she was dropping a nuclear bomb upon them all.

"_Knows!_" There was a whole bunch of murmuring and whispering all around the table now.

"But there wasn't any random letter from the Ministry about stating something out loud about our world to an unknowing Muggle. This leads me to believe that it is highly possible that this girl is indeed a witch." Gasps came from around the table as Dumbledore states this and then nodded.

"Indeed. I think I know who she may be, though I will most certainly investigate much further in order to figure out the complete truth."

Back upstairs to our very naughty little trio.

"So she's a witch then?" Ron asked, his brow furrowing as it did when he was pondering upon something.

"So it seems." Hermione nodded. "She could go to any possible wizarding school in the entire world, more likely one around these parts, like Beauxbatons. There's plenty of girls that go there that could have gone to Hogwarts. Oh! Listen!"

Back downstairs to the meeting…

"Now about how we are going to get Harry here. I say Floo Powder is not out of the question nowadays…."

And once again, back upstairs…

'Oh! Harry's going to be coming! Finally." Ginny squealed causing Hermione to roll her eyes at Ron for his sister's reaction.

"And just as she's stopped talking about him constantly at night too…. Oh well, I guess I'll live just as long as Harry's here, safe and sound. I do hope he's doing alright."

"Hermione, you know you'll nearly suffocate him with hugs when he gets here."

"I know… Oh shut it Ron!"

* * *

><p>This one isn't as long as it could be but it's still longer than it was originally. Lemme know what you thought, I hope you enjoyed it.<p>

Love,

S.Q.O.


	3. Leaving

**Simple? Not Quite.**

**_Chapter Three: Leaving_**

"Higher Harry! Higher!" Shawna giggled as the last remaining swing in the park flew through the air with her one it. She pumped her legs back and forth as Harry pushed her from behind.

"I don't know how much higher you can go without going over the bar, Shawna." Harry grinned and pushed harder, despite his statement. It had been a week since the girl's arrival at Number Four, but what a week it had been. Every free moment they had, Harry and Shawna would go to the park and just be. It was their place. They could run around, laugh, play on the park equipment that Dudley's gang hadn't broken, and just be together. Their favorite thing to do so far was to sit up in one of the larger trees and talk. They could do this for hours on end. Speaking of nothing or something, it didn't matter either way. As long as they were both together and not being plagued by the stupid Dursleys, they were happy. It was nice, Harry thought, just having a friend when he was stuck at Privet Drive. It was one of those things that made life here just a little bit more bearable, especially when his aunt and uncle got into an angry state.

Harry liked to listen to Shawna talk. He found it amazing at how many things she knew and could talk about as if she were reciting them from a book she had read until she knew it by heart… like Hermione, only not quite. Hermione stated facts when they needed them, and they always had to do with something that was going on at the moment. Shawna just blurted things out. She could name the clouds and tell all about how they became fog. Name the trees and describe their habitats, where those habitats were. She did the same with animals, especially manatees, which proved to be her favorite thing aside from the library, which she'd discovered when she'd been sent out to get some milk for Aunt Petunia's the way to the store she'd passed by the town library, Once Aunt Petunia had her milk, Shawna had grabbed Harry and dragged him away from mowing the lawn to come read books with her. Harry had gotten hell for leaving the lawn unfinished, but at least Shawna was happy.

They ended up making a game of reading the books. Harry would one up and read a few lines up it, and then if Shawna knew it she would quote it word for word, without looking at the page. If she didn't know it she would just shake her head and they'd pick a new book to try. They spent as much time in the library as they did the park. It was a great week, as far as Harry was concerned. They still had to deal with the Dursleys, but at least they had each other to sort of cheer them up afterwards.

"You're not trying hard enough. I know you can do it! Just push harder."

"I'm trying Shawna! I'm trying!" Harry pushed on her back harder, not wanting her hurt her or accidentally push her out of the swing. Shawna didn't like being pushed out of the swing; they'd discovered that the hard way yesterday. It'd been difficult to explain the dirtied bottom of her shorts. The sound of the bike wheels and voices should have warned them of the oncoming group of boys, but they were much to caught up in pretending to argue with each other to notice them until it was too late.

"Hey lookie it's Potter."

"Got yourself a girl Potter?"

"Nah, she just pities him. Don't you? Besides, she's much too pretty to like him."

Harry cringed at the voices and stopped pushing the swing. Shawna stopped pumping and stuck her feet down hard to the ground, bringing herself to a sliding stop, sending dust into the air and swinging forward a little, her momentum not completely gone.

"Get away from her Potter. Dahlia, you know you're not supposed to even look at Potter. Now come away from there and let's go." Dudley glared at them both, his jaw clenched as he stated this. He had taken to getting more praise and such from his mother by pretending to play 'big brother' around Shawna in front of his parents. Now he was doing it because his friends were around and wanted to impress them. With his gang brothers were one thing, but not a single one of them had a sister.

Shawna rose from the swing and gave Harry an apologetic look. He nodded in understanding. If Shawna disobeyed any one of the Dursleys, she could be thrown out on the streets without even the slightest thought. Therefore, she left, following Dudley's gang back toward Number Four.

Harry sighed and flopped down on the swing. He'd wait a while before he'd return to that hellhole. Dahlia… of all the flower names Aunt Petunia could pick, she picked Dahlia. Shawna could have told them her name was Shawna, but unfortunately she had agreed to being named on her first night there, after her shower and before dinner.

An hour later, Harry rose from the swing. He walked back to his only living relatives' home. By the time he got there he'd missed supper completely, but he didn't care. He just went right on up to his room and closed the door behind himself, flopping down on his bed.

It was around one am; Harry had just been awoken, having fallen asleep a bit earlier, by an awful dream. It had been about Sirius and that retched black veil at the Ministry. These had subsided a bit since Shawna had arrived to take his mind off things, but when they did come, they were a lot worse than they had been before. Getting out of bed he padded acrossed the floor, and then quietly headed downstairs to get a cold drink of water from the kitchen.

Just as he was about to head back upstairs, he heard sounds coming from the fireplace. Suddenly there was a flash of green light and a figure appeared. Harry, knowing all to well what could happen if he didn't respond quickly, let his wand slipped down his pajama shirt sleeve and into his hand. He held it up and pointed it straight at the intruder.

"Hey, hey, put that thing away before you blow someone's head off Harry!"

"Professor Lupin?" The figure straightened up and smiled at him.

"I wouldn't say professor so much any-"

"And me!" Tonks appeared out of the fireplace beside Lupin, interrupting him mid sentence. "Wotcher Harry! We've come to retrieve you." Harry's heart leapt happily, but he put a finger to his lips, grimacing at how loud she was being.

"Ssssh! You'll wake the Dursleys."

"Oh, yes, sorry. Well what are you waiting for? Hurry up and pack, let's go. We've no reason to be here longer than we absolutely have too. Nice pjs." Tonks grinned, nodding at the pajamas Harry was wearing. He looked down and felt his face grow a bit hot at the sight of the alien cowboys in space that adorned the pajamas.

"They were my cousin's…"

"Yeah yeah, suuuuure Harry. Sure."

"Tonks, now might not be the best time to discuss Harry's night attire, no matter how… amusing it may be…" Lupin looked like he was trying to hide a smile… and failing horribly at it.

"Oh, right." Harry turned and went quickly up the stairs, skipping the bottom step due to it being rather creaky, even on a good day. The two adults followed in his steps, being led to his small bedroom. Just as they were about to go in, they were stopped in their tracks by a doorknob turning and a small voice floating quietly down the hall in a whisper.

"Harry?" Shawna stood, peeking out of a small crack she'd made between the door and the door jam. Only one deep sapphire blue eye, part of a cheek, black hair, and a little bit of white material were visible through that crack from the hallway.

"Shawna!" Harry grimaced. He had been hoping to get out of there un noticed, it looked like that was no going to happen now. As much as he liked Shawna, he'd rather not have her interfere with his being free of the Dursleys. "Uh… Get back to bed."

"But… Harry…" Shawna opened the door slowly and completely, revealing that the white material was a long, completely white night gown, the hem of which floated about her ankles. The puffy sleeves of it ended at her wrist and began at her shoulders where they met a simple lace collar. Her hair was tousled from sleep, more so on the right side than the left, a sleep line across her right cheek. Even having just risen from sleep she looked pretty.

"Go!" Harry stepped forward and gently pushed her by the shoulders, back into her room and pulled the door shut after her, before quickly turning back to Tonks and Lupin and leading them into his room.

"That was a bit harsh, don't you think?" Lupin asked as Harry began grabbing every magical item he owned and needed for school from various parts of the room. Harry didn't respond, just tossed some still dirty robes into his open trunk. He hadn't bothered to close it after the first time he'd gotten into it that summer, figuring he'd just need something else out of it in the next five minutes anyway.

"Ooo! Pretty girl Harry!" Tonks teased as she bent down to pick up one of his spell books and toss that into the trunk along with a few good rolls of parchment. Harry's face reddened considerably much more than it had downstairs when his pajamas were mentioned. Lupin stared at him, looking a bit surprised.

"If I remember correctly, last I checked you had a thing for a certain Miss Chang not that long ago, did you not?"

"I…" Harry paused and furrowed his brow, shaking his head. "That one didn't work out. All she wanted to do was talk about Cedric."

"Oh."

"Anyway!" Harry blushed more and kept packing his trunk with armloads of things at a time. Tonks, tired of bending down, tugged out her wand and was about levitate a few things when…

"Harry? Who're they?" Shawna asked from the doorway, her lips forming a confused frown as she stared up at him. Tonks quickly let her wand fall back into her pocket.

"Shawna! Bed! Now!" Harry, now slightly agitated with her, grabbed her by the arm and dragged her out of the room and back down the hall. He led her back into her room, let go of her and left, closing her door behind him.

"Harry!" Lupin looked rather chocked. "This isn't like you at all. That poor girl." Harry sighed and made his way back down the hall and into his room.

"I just… She could try to stop us. And I don't want to have to explain this to her, unless she can come with us?"

"I'm afraid not, Harry. Specific orders from Dumbledore are to leave her here. He's going to work on sorting her out and finding where she belongs though, so you needn't worry. They'll keep a guard watching her as well, just in case." Lupin sighed and chucked one of Harry's school books into his trunk.

"But what if we…"

"Hrry, it's non-negotiable. Besides, it'd be difficult to explain it all to her. We could get in serious trouble with the Ministry if it turns out that she's a Muggle. She'll be taken care of, I promise."

"What's a Muggle?"

"Bloody hell!" Harry jumped and turned around to find Shawna was now sitting on his bed, staring up at him ever so innocently and expectantly it almost hurt. He really didn't want to explain this to her. To tell her that he was going to be leaving her behind here while he left to go stay with his friends. "A Muggle's… nevermind. Just go back to bed." He shut his trunk in a very forcible manner.

"But you're my best friend! I tell you everything!"

"I know that, Shawna, but right now just isn't the time. It'll all be sorted out soon. You won't have to stay here anymore. Du- my friends are going to figure out who your family is. But you can't come with us."

"But don't you trust me?"

"I trust you. But… it's just safer for you to stay here for now. Everything'll work out though. I swear, once everything is figured out, I'll write you or come see you or something, but right now, I have to go."

"So you promise?" Shawna asked, her brow furrowing as she hugged herself, looking a bit frightened. "You promise you'll come for me?"

"Yeah. I promise." Harry nodded, strode across the room and hugged her tightly. He didn't want to leave her behind, but he had to trust that Dumbledore knew what was best… he hadn't known him to be wrong before, so why should he be wrong about this one? "Go back on to bed."

Shawna nodded with a sniffle and then hugged him tight one more time before heading out of the room. She looked back at him, and Harry felt his heart break a little. He was all she really had here… and he was leaving her. It made him feel rotten inside, but there was nothing to be done.

"She'll be fine, I'll keep an eye on her personally if I have to." Lupin said, placing a hand down on Harry's shoulder. "Well let's get a move on."

"Alright." Harry got up off his bed and sighed. "Now how're we going to…?"

"Floo powder." The three headed downstairs. They left one by one. Tonks went first with the trunk, then Harry. Lupin took a good look around before he left and he could have sworn he saw a pair of deep sapphire blue eyes peeking around the corner of the living room just before he disappeared up in flames.

…..

Harry awoke the next morning the loud sound of happy squealing of his name and then the unpleasant feeling of being pounced on. Familiar arms embraced him, nearly squeezing the air out of him, the brown bushy hair that always went with this particular type of hug blocking his view of mostly everything else. Not that it really mattered, he couldn't see very well without his glasses anyways.

"Hermione… It's five am…"

"Sorry… but I couldn't help it, I've missed you… we all have." Hermione smiled at him in a genuinely happy manner as she pulled away from hugging him. She slipped away completely, joining Ginny at the end of his bed.

"Ha! Told you you'd be the first to end up strangling him! Nearly gave me a heart attack you did." Ron grinned at them from his bed, rubbing at his eyes as though Hermione's squealing had awoken him as well. That was the most likely what had happened. Ron never woke up before eight on school days, and on weekends and holidays it was at least ten before anyone even got him to open his eyes. "But it's good to see you mate… even if it is a bit earlier than expected."

"You two too! And Ginny." Harry grinned at them all, receiving smiles from each of them. He'd seen them before they'd seen him of course, when he had come into the room at about two in the morning. He'd found them all snuggled up in Ron's bed, the two girls cuddled up to the red headed boy as if he were some type of extremely comfortable and really long pillow with built in heater. It had made him smile to see all three of them at once like that, sleeping with what looked to be rather content expressions on their faces and three strings hanging down from a single large one that looked suspiciously like a really lone Extendable Ear.

"Nice PJs Harry." Ron laughed, pointing them out as soon as he caught sight of the little aliens with their cowboy hats and boots. Harry's face reddened as it had a few hours ago and brought his blankets up around himself more so, trying to hide the dreadful things.

"Tonks seemed to think so too." He states this a bit sourly, still a tad out of it from Tonks's teasing and his having to Shawna behind. He frowned and then brightened a bit, unable to be unhappy at the moment when three of his most favorite people in the world were with him. He jumped as two cracks erupted throughout the room and the Weasley twins appeared out of seemingly nowhere. They had most likely been in their bedroom or somewhere nearby, listening to the entire conversation.

"Heya Harry! We hear you've gone and gotten yourself a girlfriend!" or they'd been off talking to a certain metamorphagus. Fred grinned at him, the grin somewhat close to a smirk of knowing. Harry felt his face heat up.

"She's _not_ my girlfriend! She's barely even a friend…"

"That's not what Tonks says…" Ah, suspicion confirmed on the twins earlier whereabouts.

"Tonks… She doesn't…"

"Yeah yeah, whatever ickle lover. We'll be seeing you lot at breakfast." George grinned a grin identical to his twin brothers, and the two disapperated with two cracks.

"So, about this girl…" Ron's own grin never faded, having been on his face since he woke up to see his best friend choking his other best friend. "Well?"

"Not you too!" Harry sighed and fell back against his pillows, making them give a little 'plumph' of sound.

"Aw, c'mon mate. We've all been dying to hear about her since Mum came back a week ago and started telling the entire Order."

"Oh yes Harry, do tell!" Ginny coaxed, speaking for the first time that morning. Harry looked from her, to Ron, and then to Hermione who smiled and stated simply.

"Only if you want too." Harry closed his eyes and gave another sigh before opening them and his mouth.

"Alright. Her name's Shawna… well… I call her Shawna. The Dursleys call her Dahlia. She can't remember her real name, so we sort of just gave her ones. She chose Shawna though; she hates being called Dahlia. She puts up with it, so the Dursleys don't chuck her back out on the streets."

"How does someone show up randomly and not remember their own name?" Ginny inquired, raising one eyebrow at him curiously.

"There was some sort of accident… She doesn't remember anything about herself. Like her name, or her age, or where she's from. She's brilliant though… She just randomly knows things. She's got all these facts stored up in her brain that must have gotten put there at some point. She recites them as if she were quoting a book, like you, Hermione. She loves going to the library too… just to try and see if we can figure out which books she's read somewhere before. I can read aloud and she'll just take over without ever seeing the page… s'bit creepy."

"So, part of her mind is screwed up, but a good portion of it is still working fine… maybe she's just got temporary amnesia or something…" Hermione frowned, contemplating what Harry had just told them. He would have stopped too, if Ron hadn't probed further.

"Ah. What's she look like?" Harry moaned as they all exchanged knowing glances. Apparently they were siding with the twins and Tonks on this one.

"She… she's… well... um…" Harry felt his cheeks turn to fire, getting a blush that was worthy of a Weasley.

"So, she's rather nice looking then?" Ron laughed at Harry's blush.

"Let me guess, she's blond, straight-haired, blue eyed, kinda ditzy, and big chested?" Ginny asked in a rather sulky manner.

"No! I mean… no. Black, black, black hair… and it's not exactly straight, more.. I dunno…"

"Curly? Wavey?" Hermione provided sitting up more so on the bed.

"A little bit of both actually… It curls at the end… She's not ditzy at all, you should have already figured that out. Blue eyes… oh Merlin yes…" Harry smiled slightly, picturing just how blue and mesmerizing that particular pair of eyes happened to be. "… And her chest isn't big at all, I mean it's there, but it's…" He faltered, not exactly comfortable speaking of this topic with a pair of girls in the room. It was one thing to talk with Ron about girls and what they looked like, it was typical guy stuff. "It's sort of just the right size, I guess.

"And how do you know this exactly?" Ron's eyes widened curiously and his grin turned mischievously. He seemed to be thinking along the lines of something he shouldn't have, at least no in front of his sister.

"Ronald!" Hermione closed her eyes and shook her head in disgust at the very thought of what exactly he was picturing and why. "Harry wouldn't…"

"I didn't, I swear, Hermione." Harry's face continued to remain just as red as it had been throughout the entire conversation so far. He wasn't exactly in the mood to talk about Shawna at the moment… still feeling a bit guilty about yelling at her.

"See Ron? Don't jump to such dirty conclusions next time."

"Who said it was dirty? Oh Hermione! Who would have ever thunk you'd have such a…"

"Ronald." Hermione pursed her lips and lowered her eyebrows, giving him the same look McGonagall did when he misbehaved in class.

"C'mon Hermione, you can admit it, you're among friends… We won't judge you."

"Ronald, I swear, if you imply that I have a dirty mind one more time I'll…"

"Ok! Ok!" Ginny interrupted them before Ron had a chance to respond, not wanting to have them fighting right at the moment. "Listen, let's just all head down for breakfast. I'm sure Harry'd rather not listen to you two bicker when he's been here less than an hour… with all of us awake at least." Hermione nodded in agreement and Ron just sort of made a face that said he'd stop… for the time being at least. The male red head and the bushy brown haired ones rose from the beds and started out of the room and downstairs, clearly expecting the other two to follow right along after them. Harry sighed after they were gone and turned to look at Ginny who responded with a sigh and flopped down on the bed next to him. "They've been going at it nearly the entire one and a half weeks that Hermione's been here. Even when they're being agreeable and reasonable they're arguing. I don't know how you deal with it."

"I've grown immune to paying attention to it… That's pretty much how they are sometimes, but not always. They don't typically argue for one week straight while getting along at the same time… A few days tops. Then it's a full out row and they don't speak for a couple hours, or they're getting along great and working on homework or playing chess."

"They haven't done much of either really. They always seem to be teetering on the edge of getting along and going at each other's throats. I wish they would just shut the bloody hell up, stop beating around the bush, and snog already." Harry stared at her, having not expected that sort of response.

"Ginny? Are you feeling alright?"

"Oh Harry! You can't tell me you haven't noticed it! It's obvious to anyone with half a brain. He'll stare at her, then when she looks at him, he'll look away. He's bright, but he's always asking for help with his homework when he doesn't need it. She laughs at the some of the stupidest things he says and also does the starey lookey away thingy. You must remember how jealous he was of Victor taking her to the Yule Ball, and that time when she kissed his cheek before the Quidditch match last year… How distracted he was after she did that?" Harry pondered this for a moment and was about to respond when Ron popped his head back in the door.

"Are you two coming or not? Mum says breakfast'll get cold…"

"Yeah… yeah we're coming Ron." Harry rose from the bed and Ginny followed him and Ron out of the room and down stairs to the basement kitchen where Harry was embraced by a very excited to see him Mrs. Weasley. He sighed once more as he took his seat between Ron and Hermione at the table, setting what Ginny had said upstairs away for the time being to just enjoy being with his friends and other people whom he hadn't seen for a good three weeks.

* * *

><p>Ooook! So this one has been edited a bit from it's original version and I think it's a lot better than it was, even if it's a bit... awkward. At least, I think it is. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter, and as always, please let me know what you thought of it, I LOVE hearing from you!<p>

Love always,

S.Q.O.


	4. Summer Ending

**Simple? Not Quite.**

**_Chapter Four: Summer Ending_**

BOOM! The card house made from Exploding Snap cards went off in Ron's face, causing the current occupants of the living room at Number Twelve to start laughing. Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and the twins had been spending every, single minute of the little free time they had just hanging out and fooling around in the room. It had basically been dubbed their own as the adults mainly took to the kitchen or dining room to do things rather than the living room that they hadn't spent two weeks cleaning. The six teenagers had remained in the room for hours and hours over those two weeks, scrubbing, and mopping, and dusting, and chucking stuff out. The twins had their shop that they needed to take care of as well, but they did a good fair share of the work. Currently, it was the evening before four of the group had to head back to school, and they were just enjoying the very last bit of the summer holiday they had left.

"Oh shut up!" Ron grinned at his friends good naturedly as he gathered the Exploding Snap cards into a pile and began stacking them once more. He'd been trying to build a complete house for the past few hours, and failing miserably.

"Must you continue? Why don't you do something productive?" Hermione asked, looking up from her copy of Standardized Spells: Year Six that she was reading so to be ready for the new school year.

"Like read a book?" Ron shot right on back at her. The two had been going at it since Harry had gotten there. There were the small snipes whenever they spoke to each other, and then once every so often they'd start fighting until one of them walked off. It had built a tension about the house that one could cut with a knife if there were such a thing as a tension-cutting knife. Frankly, they were starting to get on everyone's last nerve with it. Harry didn't know how he was going to put up with their bickering once they got back to school and there was no Mrs. Weasley to hush them or the twins to tease them into stopping. At least he had Ginny. She was just as sick of it as he was, but there wasn't much either of them could do about it but try and keep the peace.

"That wouldn't be such a bad idea. This year's going to be a lot tougher than last year." Harry suggested, rising from the floor where he had just been beaten playing chess against Fred. He wandered over and plopped down on the couch next to Hermione and took up one of her new books, the one assigned for Transfiguration.

"But Harry! It's summer! We can read all that stuff when it's assigned... or better yet, not at all." Harry sighed, keeping the peace was starting to get harder and harder when he grew closer and closer to blowing his top at his two best friend's for their immature actions towards one another. He couldn't help but agree with Ron on this one though, he always did when it came to schoolwork.

"Alright, how about a game of chess then?"

"I beat you twenty seven times this morning already." Which, was, rather unfortunately, true. Ron wasn't only good at chess like he had been a few years ago, now he was absolutely superb at it and almost unbeatable by anyone at school, including quite a few very brainy Ravenclaws whom had challenged him last term.

Boom! The cards exploded before he had even gotten halfway finished with his house this time. Finally giving up, Ron shoved the cards aside and fall back against the hearthrug. "I'm bored."

"Me too." Ginny piped up, rubbing at her eyes and rising from the chair where she'd been snuggling Crookshanks for the past hour and a half. She stretched luxuriously before yawning and looking around at them all. "What do you say we all head to bed now instead of in half an hour when you all know Mum's going to come in and tell us to do so anyways."

"Bed, sounds good." Hermione nodded and marked her page, somewhere towards the very end of the book and rose from the couch. No doubt she'd be finishing it up in her and Ginny's bedroom within a matter of minutes. Harry nodded and stood up from the couch as well, yawning. It had been a long day, and he was ready to head back to Hogwarts, having had enough of summer for now. He needed classes to help distract his mind away from a certain ebony haired girl he just couldn't seem to keep his mind off of ever since he had come here in the first place.

"C'mon Ron. Let's get some sleep." The youngest male redhead sighed and rose from the floor, leaving his cards where they were. No doubt to be collected in a frenzy in the morning before they left. The four headed upstairs, leaving the twins to cart all their mugs of hot cocoa that had been left in there over the course of the day to the kitchen. The boys bade goodnight to the girls when they reached their landing and headed into their room, bolting the door shut against the possibility of Kreacher barging in on them as he seemed to have a habit of doing when they didn't lock it.

They climbed into their separate beds, turned out the lights, said goodnight, and fell fast asleep, Ron snoring, and Harry tossing and turning.

"_Harry! Harry! Harry!"_

"_Shawna!" Harry spotted her at the end of the hall way in the upstairs of Number Four, just outside the door to her bedroom, a large, pudgey hand with sausage-like fingers wrapped around her neck. "I'm coming Shawna!"_

"_Harry, help me!" Shawna cried before the hand closed tighter and she could speak no more. She looked scared beyond belief, tears rolling silently down her cheeks. Harry ran faster, and faster, but he just couldn't get to her, the hall seemed to be getting longer, and longer, though neither Harry, nor Shawna, the door, and the hand changed in size at all. _

_The hand suddenly let go of Shawna and she cried, letting out a sob. "I guess we're not as close as I thought we were. I'm sorry I even bothered!" Uncle Vernon's face came flying out of the door, his pudgey hands grabbing Shawna and dragging her into the room, slamming the door closed behind them. Harry continued to run foreward, actually making distance on the hallway now. He banged on the door, trying to open it, but he just couldn't._

"_Shawna! Shawna! I didn't mean it! Shawna! No please, let her go, bring her back! Shawna!"_

"Harry! Harry! Harry! Wake up!" Harry felt something smacking his face and he opened his eyes, sunlight burning them. He quickly blinked a few times, letting them adjust before he felt someone hand him his glasses and he put them on his face. Ron was standing there beside his bed, staring down at him with a slightly worried look on his face. "You alright mate?"

Harry stared at him, breathing heavily, feeling cold due to being drenched with sweat as opposed to not being so when he had gone to bed. He nodded and then shook his head, and nodded again. "Yeah… I'm fine… Just a dream."

"About Shawna?"

"Yeah. How'd you...?"

"You were yelling again mate. Something about Shawna and bringing her back. And you bloody near kicked me in the stomach when I was trying to wake you."

"Sorry."

"S'alright. You'd better hurry and get dressed though. Mum'll have a fit if we're not ready to leave soon."

"Right." Harry shook his head clear and got up out of bed. He quickly changed his clothes and checked his trunk to make sure everything was there. He had packed it the day before, in the early afternoon after lunch, so it should have been all there, and it was. He then got Hedwig to come down off the wardrobe and get into her cage so he could lock that up and get her ready for the trip as well. He then lugged her cage, and his trunk, downstairs and into the entry way where the other's trunks already were. Mrs. Weasley handed him a muffin, sating there was no time for them to dilly dally eating breakfast this morning when they had to be at the station in an hour and no one had bothered getting up at the early, scheduled time, even though she'd been upstairs to yell at them all thrice.

Everyone helped pack the luggage into the back of one large ministry car, the same type that they had used three years previously. Then, after hugs from the people not going to see them off, Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Ginny climbed into the backseat of the car whilst Mrs. Weasley climbed into the front along with Bill who would help protect them all if need be. It was a rather quiet, sleepy car trip to Kings Cross Station, no one except Mrs. Weasley having much to say. She reminded them to be careful and keep themselves out of trouble.

They unloaded their luggage and got trolleys to put it on. Mrs. Weasley rushed them all through the station, not wanting to be late for the train's departure as they only had about ten minutes to get there, say goodbye, and get on before it was going to leave. All six magic folk made it through the barrier in record time and onto the bustling Platform 9 ¾.

"Alright then you lot. Now, be good, don't get into any trouble, make sure you finish all your homework, and study hard…" Mrs. Weasley hugged and kissed each of them in turn whilst Bill did the same, only minus the kissing of anyone but Ginny and with much more manly hugs than his mother's death grip ones that made you feel all warm and fuzzy inside, not the mention loved. Once through with that they all rushed to board the train, as they didn't have much time to do so.

"Be careful!" Were the last words they heard from Mrs. Weasley before the train started moving. Harry and Ron had to grab Hermione so she wouldn't get left behind and need to run to catch them. They waved a few times before closing the door and heading off down the corridor, dragging their trunks behind them.

Ron and Hermione departed to the Prefects' compartments to receive their schedules for this year, whilst Ginny wandered away to find some of her fifth year friends. Harry sighed and headed in the opposite direction of all of them, in hopes of finding a compartment with one of his fellow Gryffindor sixth years in it, more so Neville, or Seamus and Dean, rather than Parvati or Lavender. And, oh he was in luck!

"Hiya Harry!" Neville Longbottom poked his head out of the compartment Harry had just passed and grinned. Harry smiled back and turned right on around.

"Hey Neville! Got three extra seats?" He was very pleased to see the boy who had helped him in the Department of Mysteries last June when all his other friends had become injured beyond capability of doing so.

"Kidding? We've got four!" Neville slid the door all the way open for him to enter, revealing that he was sitting with Luna Lovegood as well. It was starting to turn out to be just the way the seating had been last year, which was just fine by Harry. He dragged his trunk inside and with Neville's help, hoisted it up into the luggage rack.

Luna looked up from The Quibbler she was reading, something on the cover about Deafing Dradle Drimples… whatever those were. "Hello Harry."

"Hey…" Harry smiled slightly and flopped down in the seat acrossed from her. The train started to move, and chugga chugga. The usual callings out of parents yelling one last goodbye to their loved children, nieces, nephews, grandkids… could be heard, and then were drowned out as the train passed the end of the platform and carried on it's way towards Hogwarts. About ten minutes into the trip a few rather unwelcome visitors came to er… pay the trio a visit.

"Why if it isn't Potter and his merry band of nothings." Harry groaned at the voice at was accompanied by three figures entering the compartment in a very unwelcome manner.

"Get lost Malfoy."

"Or what?" Malfoy sneered at them all crossing his arms, his wand in his hand. "What are you going to do?"

"Just leave."

"Why should we? We have nothing better to do. How about a dual Potter? Me, and you? Loser leaves Hogwarts forever."

"I said get out!" Harry rose to his feet, aggravated due to already being frustrated with himself for yelling at Shawna those few weeks ago. He hadn't even been able to write her or anything. He and the rest of his friends were not allowed to leave the house the entire time they had been at Number Twelve due to the adults wanting to keep them safe. If they had been able to get out, Harry would have gone to the Muggle Post Office and mailed her letter.

"No. I hear you have a girl friend Potter. How you could ever manage to get such an attractive one is beyond knowing. You probably drugged her or something."

"Get out!" Harry tugged his wand from his sleeve, pointing it directly at the blond hated boy. He didn't even get a chance to mutter a single spell before the Slytherin crippled to the ground, his face covered with great flapping things. Ginny appeared from behind Crabbe and Goyle. They too, had large flapping things all over their faces, as well as something disgustingly gooey. She sighed, tucking her wand away and kindly stepping on Malfoy's face as she entered, the sound of a nose cracking was clear as she did so.

"He said get out. Now quit squirming like slugs and do so." The group of injured Slytherins glared the best they could and scurried out of the compartment without any further words of taunting. Ginny flopped down into one of the empty seats and looked up at Harry who was tucking his wand away. "You alright?"

"Yeah. Just bloody pissed off."

"Gotcha. Here, this might help." She reached into her pocket and tugged out a chocolate frog, tossing it to Harry who caught it as he sat down across from her. "I swiped it off Dean a few minutes ago."

"Thanks…" Harry unwrapped the frog and bit into it happily, savoring the wonderful taste of chocolate. Ever since Lupin had given him chocolate to make him feel better after his very first encounter with a dementor in third year well, it tended to help with a lot of things. "Why aren't you with Dean anyway?"

"Welcome. He and Seamus are off trying to rid the world of Slytherins with pants and replace them with skirts. I was on my way to help them when I heard you yelling."

"Oh."

"Well, I best go find them before they get themselves cursed or killed. See ya later Harry, Neville, Luna." With that Ginny rose from her seat and skipped out, drawing her wand as she did so, leaving the two other Gryffindors, and the Ravenclaw staring after her. Not too much longer after she had left, Ron and Hermione appeared, fighting like a cat and a dog in a rainstorm.

"Oh Ronald! I swear! We have to go do our rounds! We can't just skive them off because you're hungry!"

"Yes we can. Live a little Hermione. We'll do them later."

"It won't be our turn later. Do you really want to lose your badge?"

"Yes... No… er…"

"You don't. Now c'mon." It was a very, very brief appearance by all means. They had barely said hello and sat down when they had to say goodbye and leave to go do their rounds, Hermione dragging Ron out forcibly by his jumper sleeve, ignoring his cries that she was going to stretch it and make him have one sleeve longer than the other which would make him look like a nutter.

The Hogwarts Express kept on chugging and choo-chooing, all the way. It passed fields and towns, and through forests and mountains, as it always did. Over bridges and tunnels, and through all sorts of weather. The rest of the ride after Ron and Hermione left and then later came back was quite uneventful if you didn't count the lively game of chess where the pieces fell over at every turn or the game of Exploding Snap where just about everyone nearly lost their eyebrows. And still, the train kept on moving…and moving… and moving…

….

If the train ride had felt long, then the feast felt even longer as Harry sat there, staring up at the Great Hall's ceiling. It was still covered with dark clouds, thunder, and lighting that couldn't get to them because they were truly inside and not out. He was deep in thought. He had been since the train had stopped in Hogsmeade, and they had made their way up to the castle in the carriages still towed by the slightly creepy looking thestrals. He just couldn't seem to bring his mind away from the thought of what might be happening to Shawna. The thunderstorm had reminded him of her, she'd shown up in one after all.

"Harry? Aren't you going to eat anything?" Harry was brought back from his stupor and turned his head to his right to look at a concern faced Hermione. He frowned at her and shook his head. "What's wrong?" Hermione's question seemed to bring about the attention of Ron who turned to look at them from Harry's left, a fork of mashed potatoes halfway to his mouth.

"You are starting to look a bit peaky mate…"

"It's nothing just… just nothing." Harry forced a smile and reached forward to grab the bowl of mashed potatoes and scoop some onto his plate, but before his fingers could so much touch the bowl, all the food disappeared to be replaced automatically with dessert. Harry blinked and looked down at his clean plate. Had he really spent the entire time the food was there thinking? He supposed he must have, because he definitely hadn't eaten a single thing. Sighing he directed his hand to the plate beside the dish he was now reaching for and took up a treacle tart.

The feast ended quickly, and Harry could tell his two best friends were a bit worried about him. On their way up to Gryffindor tower, they kept exchanging glances as they did when they had something to speak about, but couldn't. Giving a sigh of frustration at them, he stopped dead in his tracks and spun around.

"Look, everything's fine, I'm fine. See?" he smiled and pointed to his mouth. He didn't want them to worry; there was no need for them too.

"Harry, don't. We know something's wrong, just tell us…"

"I'm just worried about Shawna is all." Harry admitted, unable to take the looks on their faces. They were just so… so Ron and Hermione. If he couldn't tell them what was on his mind, who else was there? It wasn't like it was some big secret that he missed Shawna, if anyone could tell, it'd be his best friends.

"Oh Harry, listen, she's probably just fine. The Dursleys have treated her well enough so far, haven't they?" Harry blinked and nodded. The Dursleys had been taking care of Shawna better than they ever had him. Though, that didn't take much of his concern away, and apparently it showed on his face.

"Hey, maybe we could ask Dumbledore to check up on her?" Ron suggested as they started walking again, not wanting to look suspicious as they had been known to toe the line of rules in the past and most times that involved them lingering in the halls for long periods of time, conversing as they were now.

Hermione shook her head. "Honestly Ronald, do you really think Dumbledore would have time to do that? He's most likely very busy at the moment with You-Know-Who out there…" Ron responded with a frown and then his face lit up.

"How 'bout my mum then? She'll do it! She'd do anything for Harry."

"We can't put things like that into a letter! What if it gets intercepted?"

"So? Well ask her… in code or something."

"Or we could just send a letter to Shawna…"

'Yeah, that'd go over real well with the Dursleys." Harry piped up at last, rolling his eyes at the pair of them. "Let's send one to Ron's mum… We'll figure some sort of code out." Hermione sighed, unable to go against both of them at once at the moment.

"Oh alright."

"Thanks Hermione. Help us with a code?" Hermione sighed at them in a frustrated manner before nodding.

"Of course."

"Great… can we start right away?"

"Harry, can't we do it tomorrow? I'm tired." Hermione looked at him pleadingly. "I'll go to the library first thing and look up codes for you. Or think of something or other that Mrs. Weasley would be able to figure out that others wouldn't really get." Harry frowned. He didn't want to go to sleep without knowing that there was a letter on the way to Mrs. Weasley… one that had a meaning between the lines that would let her know he needed to know how Shawna was.

"But… Shawna…"

"Harry, I know you care for her, and I'm sure you have every reason too, but right now, there's nothing we can do for her until we're thinking completely clearly… or at least enough to actually devise something or other Mrs. Weasley wouldn't need a book to decode."

"How about we ask her to check up on my little brother's black goldfish?" Ron suggested after he'd kept his mouth closed the entire time. "Mum's always saying how Harry's like another son to her… And you said Shawna's got black hair right? And Mum's seen her?"

"That's a really good idea Ron." Hermione nodded praisingly. Ron's ears tinged pink at her compliment before he coughed a weak 'thanks, 'mione.', though the brown haired girl didn't seem to notice the slightest bit of the shortening of her name.

"Brilliant Ron! She'd understand that for sure! Though… Shawna's more like… a kitten or a bird than a goldfish." Harry grinned and stopped as they reached the Fat Lady. She looked down at them, smiling slightly.

"Password?"

"Then we can say she's a kitten… Friendship. You've already got Hedwig, so a bird's out." The portrait swung open and they climbed inside, still chattering away, more happily than they had earlier.

"Great. So we can write her tonight!"

"But Harry! It's already past curfew!"

"So? That's never stopped us before."

"Do you really want to get in trouble on the very first night back?"

"If it means finding out if Shawna is safe or not… I think I'll go insane if I don't." Harry ran a hand through his hair in frustration. What he said was true. His heart and mind were both going berserk with the need to find out if that simple girl was alright or not.

"I'll come with you mate. I've gotta do the writing anyway."

"Ron! You're a Prefect! You can't just…"

"Hermione! Harry's mental stability is on the line here…"

"I just need to send a letter Hermione… a letter."

"Harry…"

"Please… for Shawna?"

"Fine. But I really wish you wouldn't. If either of you gets in trouble already…"

"We'll be careful. Besides, we've got the invisibility cloak." Hermione shook her head at them as she bade them goodnight and disappeared up the girls' staircase. Harry and Ron decided to write the letter right there rather than waiting until they got to the Owlery. It was better not to risk the amount of time they might have up there when they went.

"So, a kitten?"

"A kitten. A black one." Ron nodded and wrote in his untidy scrawl, the letter to his mother. It looked something like this:

_Dear Mum,_

_I know we've just barely gotten here, but I miss you. I think it's best that we try and stay in contact. Gin does too. With You-Know-Who out there somewhere, there's a good chance that anyone could be killed. We'll keep an eye on the newspaper for deaths, though, I'm not sure how trustworthy the Prophet is these days. I haven't really trusted it much since it said all that stuff about Harry Potter. I share a dorm with him, and he's not a raging lunatic wanting attention. He's just Harry. Anyways, my little brother's wondering if you'd check up on his kitten. The black one with the weird eyes that he got this past summer. He also wants to know if you think she'll be old enough to bring back to Hogwarts with us after Christmas. He just doesn't want her lost is all. _

_Love you Mum,_

_Bilius._

Harry snorted reading it over. "It doesn't sound like you at all, Ron."

"Well, it's not me. It's Bilius. Hedwig'll be able to find her if we just tell her where to take it right? Because writing an address on it might complicate things if it gets intercepted…"

"She can do it. She's smart, and she knows exactly where to find everyone. She found Sirius…" Harry gulped and then smiled slightly, remembering the giant tropical bird that had dropped off the letter he had received from his godfather the summer after his third year.

"Alright then." Ron rolled up the scroll and just wrote 'Mum' on the outside before pocketing it.

"Let's go." Harry looked around and took his invisibility cloak out when he found the common room completely empty except for themselves. He and Ron stood up off the couch and threw it over themselves just as the portrait hold opened and a dark figure entered. Harry was about to reach for his wand when the figure stepped into the light. It was just a girl. She was in their year, for he remembered seeing her in the back of class all the time. She wasn't a beautiful like Lavender or Parvati. No, she was more plain, like Hermione, though even Harry had to admit, not as pretty. Her nose was slightly crooked as though it'd been broken, her eyes were a plain shade of brown while her hair was dirty blond and unkept. That was part of what made her not pretty. She always smelt weird whenever anyone managed to get close to her, her hair was greasey, and she was quiet and mean towards just about every one. She was smart though. They'd heard at the end of last year that if she had just gotten one more point, she would have tied with Hermione for being best in all of the classes. Everyone, even a few of the teachers, called her Gryffindor's Ravenclaw.

When the girl had disappeared up the girls' stairs, Harry poked Ron in the ribs and they went off and out the portrait hold.

"Bloody hell, she's getting in late. What time is it?"

"I dunno, my watch got broken a couple years ago. What's your's say?"

"I don't have one either. But it's got to be at least one in the morning by now. It's quiet enough."

"I don't think it's quite that late." Harry shrugged and they made their way to the Owlery. It was only the first night back, so there wasn't much to avoid, so they made it there and back without a single hitch, which was a first for them.

Harry lay in bed thinking, hoping that Hedwig was ok and that she would have the letter to Mrs. Weasley by breakfast at the most and maybe he'd have a response by lunch. Sighing, he fell into a deep sleep. Shawna floated throughout his dreams with Ron, Hermione, Neville, that weird Gryffindor's Ravenclaw girl, Lavender, Parvati, Dean, Seamus, Ginny, Luna, all the Weasleys, Dobby, Dumbledore, even his parents and Sirius were there… everyone he knew by at least sight and wasn't leaned towards Voldemort's side. They were having a gigantic picnic and playing games of Quidditch down by the lake… Overall it was a very nice dream.

* * *

><p>Alright, so this one has finally be revamped a bit, though it's not up to my usual par. It's alright though, because it was written years ago. :) Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter and I hope to have more editing done soon. I totally forgot I was reuploading this one. Let me know what you thought, it always makes my day!<p>

Love,

S.Q.O.


	5. School Days

**Simple? Not Quite.**

_**Chapter Five: School Days**_

Harry awoke early the next morning. Naturally, Ron wasn't awake but it was also so early that even Neville, the earliest riser out of all the boys, was still snoring away and didn't look like he'd be up at any time soon. Harry glanced at the clock and blinked. He'd never been up at five thirty am at Hogwarts before. Classes didn't even start until nine and he usually waited until eight before dragging himself out of bed and being ready for breakfast by the time eight fifteen rolled around.

Rolling over, Harry tried to get back to sleep, but by six it was to no avail and he decided getting up would be his best option. He was able to take his time in the bathroom, not worrying that one of his friends would need it in a matter of seconds…After getting dressed he grabbed his bag and made his way downstairs to the Great Hall. He was hungry, having not eaten much the night before except for that treacle tart. He'd just been so hung up about Shawna and worrying. He felt lighter now that they'd sent out the letter asking for Mrs. Weasley to check up on her. Pretty soon he'd either be bursting his way out of the school, or his mind would be at ease for a few days before he'd want another update on the girl's current status with the Dursleys.

Upon reaching the Great Hall he found there to be only one single other occupant eating breakfast. He blinked and she looked up as his footsteps echoed in the hallway. Ok, so Gryffindor's Ravenclaw got up super early and went to bed rather late. Probably not a good combination, but then again, he couldn't spot any bags under her eyes or anything so she must be used to it. Harry sat himself down the table from her, but not too far from her. He didn't want to seem like a jerk or anything. No, that would be bad.

"Good morning Harry." Harry turned and looked up. Dumbledore had just come into the hall and was approaching the table with a slight smile upon his face. Harry returned it.

"Good morning Professor."

"Harry, it seems that my memory is not at all what it used to be. I am afraid I have forgotten to tell you something I should have done much earlier."

"Yes Professor?"

"Now, as you obviously know, you and your friend, Mister Ronald Weasley, sent Molly Weasley a letter last night containing a simple request to see how your, excuse me, 'kitten' was faring. I am happy to tell you, though a bit late, that she was reunited with her father a few days ago and her memory has been returned to her. I am afraid to say though, that rather unfortunately, the time she spent with you seems to have been as lost as her name was when you found her." Harry blinked and looked down at the table before looking up at his Headmaster again.

"Can I see her?"

"Harry, you know you can't possibly."

"But Professor…"

"No Harry. Now, eat your breakfast, I daresay Miss Granger will be down at any moment and you don't want to look ill when she gets here, and I need not say why as I'm sure you already know." Harry sighed and looked down at his plate. Hermione would definitely nag at him to go to the Hospital Wing if he looked sick… or constantly ask if he was alright. That was never fun.

It was around half an hour before the Great Hall started filling up with more people. Harry had watched Gryffindor's Ravenclaw leave right before there came to be more than five people at the Gryffindor table including herself. Harry watched the door she'd left through, waiting for Ron or Hermione to appear. It was not long before they came in, chatting to one another as though they hadn't had a teeny argument over writing Ron's mum a letter the night before. When they saw Harry that each took a seat on either side of him.

"Mail come yet mate?" Ron inquired thoughtfully; looking up at the cloud patched blue sky that currently adorned the Great Hall's enchanted ceiling. Harry, knowing what he was on about, shook his head.

"No. Dumbledore came in earlier though, said she'd gone back to her dad."

"Oh Harry…" Hermione frowned, her eyebrows knitting in worry at she looked from him to Ron. "It... It's better though, isn't it? Her going home is the best outcome when you compare it to staying alone with the Dursleys…" Harry forced a smile.

"Yeah, it's brilliant. Couldn't have hoped for anything else really… Dumbledore says it'd be impossible to even visit her as she'd have no clue who I am, but…"

"I'm so sorry Harry! That's awful!" Hermione looked worried again, her teeth going out to bite her lower lip as they always did when she was anxious. "Did he tell you anything else? Her real name? Where she lives?" Harry blinked. He hadn't even bothered to ask after everything else.

"No, he didn't."

"He probably figures if you did, you'd try to track her down…" Harry and Hermione turned to look at Ron who's mouth was currently half full of bacon.

"That's it… I'll figure out where she is and go see her without Dumbledore's help."

"Be reasonable Harry, there must be a logical explanation as to why he didn't t-…"

"That is the logical explanation Hermione!"

"You've got to do what Dumbledore thinks is best, and if he thinks you shouldn't be allowed to visit Shawna…"

"I don't care what Dumbledore thinks is best!" Harry jabbed his fork sharply into a piece of toast. He repeated this motion until he had mutilated the poor hot bread spread with butter (Oh my god that makes me hungry).

"Harry calm down."

"If you're not going to help me, I'll just find someone else." Hermione sighed at that, glancing down at her plate, her hand hardening around her spoon.

"Alright then. I'll try and find something, but I'm not promising anything, especially if she's a Muggle." Harry grinned at her.

"That's all I ask."

Later in the day after they'd had a grueling double History of Magic class, Harry, Ron, and Hermione could be found digging through stacks of books in the library. Harry was pouring over one two foot thick, brown covered book. It had a column of wizarding pictures on the far left of the page, followed by each person's name, age, occupation, country, and address. The whole thing was in alphabetical order and was part of a series of books that took up nearly one whole row of book shelves. Hermione said the books held every wizard or witch that had ever been born. Every picture was magically updated anytime someone changed appearance even the slightest bit.

"Are you sure she'll be in here?"

"If she's a witch she will. You'd recognize her, right?"

"Of course!"

"Well then keep looking."

"What if she's not in this one? I mean, she might have been born after 1980." Harry was starting to get put out. He'd probably looked at least a thousand faces already, and he was only into the D's.

"Then she'd be in the 1981 through1985 edition… if we could just…" Hermione stared up at that particular volume of the book. They had not had too much trouble getting the other one. It had been the last one on the bottom shelf of the second to last book case, but the other one they needed was the first one on the very top of the next book case over. "Ron, you're tall, you come fetch it."

Ron grumbled something incoherent, but rose from his 'helping' Harry look at pictures and names. He went to stand by Hermione and look up at the top shelf. "Bloody hell that's high." He jumped, but his hand missed the book by inches. "I can't get it." Hermione sighed and crossed her arms, looking up at the book and biting the corner of her lower lip. She then dropped her arms and looked at Ron, then back up at the book.

"Ok then…" She frowned at Ron. "Crouch, please." Ron stared at her in confusion, shaking his head and crouching down. Hermione stopped the confused look upon his face by swinging one leg over his shoulders, quickly followed by the other, making sure to pat her skirt down so it didn't end up on top of his head. He grabbed her legs to help keep her on and stood up. "Please don't droooop! Me!"

Harry looked to watch as Hermione yelped and grabbed onto Ron's head, squeezing her eyes shut. He laughed as his two best friends tottered a bit before Ron gained balance and stepped towards the bookshelf.

"Now why the bloody hell would I do that? You and I both know that if you suffer brain damage, I'm screwed for passing this year. Now let go and get the book." Hermione shook her head and then took a deep breath, opening her eyes. Harry thought she looked rather determined to not look down as she let go of Ron's head and took hold of the large book with both hands. Ron tottered again, sending Harry from his seat to grab hold of him. The extra heavy book had thrown the whole 'not gonna let you fall' thing, out the window.

Hermione quickly handed the book down to Harry and Ron regained being able to stay upright with a girl on his shoulders, at fact that seemed to please him greatly as he decided to walk along the row of book cases and then continue on out of sight, though they weren't quite out of earshot yet.

"Ronald Weasley! You put me down right this minute!"

"Nope."

"Rooooooooo-oooooooon! Don't do that!" Harry laughed. Hermione's voice had gone from angry to a high pitched squeal right before he had lost hearing distance on the pair. He returned to his books until the bell rang, but he had not once caught sight of hair blacker than his, nor eyes as deep blue as the night sky.

Much to Hermione's displeasure, the trio of friend left the library with only four feet on the ground and one taller than normal. Ron was having way to much fun with this opportunity and Hermione was started to get over the fact that she might fall. He hadn't dropped her the entire time they'd been like this, though, the brown haired one was still averting her eyes from the floor as they headed for Defense Against the Dark Arts.

The class was already lined up outside the door, waiting for the new Professor to unlock it. When he did there was a great whispering, and chattering mixed with smiles, though there were some wary looks of those that had not quite forgotten the last time he'd been here and what they had learned.

"Professor Lupin!"

"You've come back!"

"Yes, yes, now take your seats please, we've got a lot of catching up to do after last year's most unhelpful way of teaching. Ron, you might want to set Hermione down now, before Professor McGonagall sees, she's right next door and she'd have an absolute fit."

"Right." Ron grinned and bent his knees, finally letting Hermione slip down onto the floor. The three friends took seats at a table towards the front of the room. It was not as if they hadn't seen their favorite Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher between the time of his being here, but they were as happy as most of the class to have him back. He was much better than anyone else they'd ever had, that was for sure.

"Alright. In the two years that I haven't been able to return to you, what have you learned?" Hands shot up into the air. "Seamus?"

"We learned about the Unforgivable Curses."

"Really? I thought you weren't supposed to hear of those until this year? Well then, we'll cross that off the list. Anything else? Yes Dean." Dean looked around, and Harry was fairly certain why. The class was made up of every Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff sixth year. There was not a single Slytherin in the bunch, but there was a great deal of members from a certain secret group that had formed and met in the Room of Requirement.

"Some of us have learned new spells. Like, the Disarming Spell, Reducto, stunning, those sorts… and there's also quite a few of use who have been able to produce a Patronus…" Lupin smiled.

"Ah, of course. I've heard of your 'Dumbledore's Army.' I suspect that is who you are speaking of?"

"Er…"

"Yes." Harry nodded, proud that Dean had acknowledged what they had learned last year, what he had taught them.

"How many of you are there?" Hands went up into the air, some hesitant, most shooting upwards with enthusiasm. "Wow, that's about two thirds of the class isn't it? Now then, we're going to work on honing these skills, and teaching the others them as well. We are most certainly be going to learn many new things as well. We left off with Red Caps did we not?" There was a murmur of agreement and the class settled into a sort of content stupor mixed with the sound of scratching quills as Lupin began writing notes on the particular creature on the board. They were very glad to have a teacher who knew what he was doing again and made it fun.

"And that class, is all you need to know about Red Caps. Tricky little buggers, but not hard to handle. Now…" He reached behind his desk and took out a black stone bowl. "Each of you is going to research and write a paper about a creature we have not yet studied. I would like at least half a roll of parchment on it, which should be an acceptable length to ask for considering you all should be able to find plenty of information in the library or your text books, though I will be more than happy to help any of you that need it. I've got books about anything you could imagine and more. Now then, take a slip and tell me your creature."

The class murmured in excitement, each taking a slip of paper from the bowl as it got passed around and announcing (and sometimes mispronouncing) the names of what animal they were to be researching.

"Now, I don't want you lot to write it in the normal research report format. I want you to be creative with this one. Give me a story with the information within it or you can draw picture and diagrams. Write a song. If you wish to partner up and do a skit about two creatures with another person, then by Merlin, do it! Just make it your own!" He got to the back of the classroom where the strange, smart, yet horrid girl sat. She took the last slip of paper and with an actual smile, looked up at Professor Lupin.

"May I do a news story with an interview of a certain professor?" Lupin smiled down at her as her soft, hardly ever heard voice had heads turning in curiosity.

"Of course Eva, I've got a student coming in for detention tonight at eight, but why don't you join us? He's just going to be doing lines."

"Alright then. Thank you." Lupin nodded and made his way back up the aisle between the desks. He replaced the bowl behind his desk just as the bell rang. "Off to your next class then and don't forget to work on your project!"

"Why d'you think she asked for an interview?" Ron stated curiously as soon as they had left the classroom and were on their way towards Charms.

"Oh Ron, think! Obviously she's doing her project on werewolves."

"But haven't we already gone over those?"

"With Snape yes, but he never did more than give us the assignment. I expect Lupin threw it in for fun. Evania's lucky, really, we've got one right here that can help give her inside information rather than just stuff from a book. I would love to be able to do that, but I'm afraid I don't know any Kneazles, nor would we be able to communicate if I did."

"S'better than a Lethifold. I mean, what the bloody hell is a Lethifold?"

"Ron, that's a really good one! It's going to give you nightmares."

"Great. What'd you get again Harry?"

"Um.. A Snidget?" Harry looked at Hermione. Surely she would know what a Snidget was. He thought he could remember reading about them someplace before, but he wasn't sure.

"You couldn't have gotten a better one for you Harry."

"Why?"

"You read Quidditch Through the Ages, right?"

"Yes, but…"

"Then you should remember that a Snidget was the original Golden Snitch?" Harry blinked and then smiled as it dawned on him.

"Oh yeah, they almost died out because they kept getting killed."

"Yes!"

"I still wish I could've gotten werewolves.." Ron looked down at his slip of paper moodily. "Could've interviewed Lupin…"

"Oh Ron, don't fuss. It's good that Evania got it."

"Why?"

"Last time Lupin was here, she actually was in the dorm at the same time, bothered to shower, and was much nicer than she normally is."

"Somebody had a crush."

"Actually, I think she was just glad to have someone to talk to for a change who enjoys the same things she does. She spent as much time in Lupin's classroom as she spends in the library."

"Well, if she ever bothered talking to you…" Hermione shook her head.

"Trust me, I've tried, but you two keep me so busy… Besides, she never seems to want to talk to me when I offer, and it's rather difficult to catch her."

"Well, anyway…" Harry decided to change the subject before the two of them started really bickering about something stupid. He was glad that they arrived at Charms that very moment, for he was out of things to discuss. If the other two fought, it'd be a very long day and make looking for Shawna in the books later more difficult.

…...

Harry yawned, covering his mouth and rubbing at his left eye as he did so. The snores that currently filled the sixth year Gryffindor boys' dorm were the common sounds that could be heard in this particular room every night at one in the morning. Open upon our hero's lap was one of the books he was currently pursuing, in the hope of spotting the familiar face of one, Shawna. It was really starting to get on his nerves that he had no idea where to find her though. He'd been awake for hours looking through these numerous volumes and still, he hadn't come across a single person who even remotely looked like her. He'd seen black hair, and blue eyes yes, but never the right facial features, and no eyes so dark or mesmerizing. He wasn't about to give up though. He, Ron, and Hermione had gone to the library straight after their classes and when they had been shooed out, Harry had checked out both the 1976-1980 and 1982-1985 versions of the books.

Sighing, Harry leaned forward; eyes skimming the page alighted by his wand so as not to wake the others. He was weary, but not completely out of hope. If Shawna was a witch, he was bound to find her sooner or later, and if she was a Muggle... well then.. he'd probably end up banging on Dumbledore's study door and refuse to leave until he was allowed to go see her. Either way, he was determined to find her. Sure, he'd only known her a week, but that had been an amazing week. She'd been the only friend he had in that house besides Hedwig and face it, a human is typically better than an owl as they can actually speak back.

Sometimes around two in the morning, Harry lanced over at the clock on the wall and fell back with a sigh, his pillows sinking beneath him. His body begged him for sleep, but his mind refused as he forced himself to sit back up. Figuring he'd have a better chance of staying awake to search if he wasn't in bed, he slipped his feet down to the floor and picked up the two large books. They were very heavy in his arms, but he made his way out of the dorm, bare foot, tired, and very much against going to sleep until he found what he was looking for or was convinced that she wasn't in there.

Getting down to the common room, Harry chose to sit on the floor rather than in a chair. In a chair he'd be more likely than not, to fall asleep. He dropped the books down with two loud thumps before flopped down beside them and taking up the one he'd just been on. He flipped it open where his bookmark had been placed and continued skimming the faces. The common room was dark though, making it difficult to see. Harry lit is wand with a mutter and began trailing it down the photos of each face jumping when a quite, but cold voice reached his ears.

"Potter, why aren't you in bed?" Harry looked up and held up his wand as well towards where the sound had come from. The light ended on a pair of pink socked feet and the bottom of a pair of soft looking pajama pants, black and printed with cherries. Raising his wand higher, Harry made out a matching button up top, two hands on a pair of hips, then a chest, and a neck, and finally a face. It was Gryffindor's Ravenclaw, eyes sharp, hair pulled back in what looked like a very tight and painful bun… at least to sleep with. What had Hermione called her earlier? Eva-something.. Evaline? No… Evani? That wasn't it either… Evania… yes… Evania.

"I was just... wait a moment, why aren't you in bed?" Harry inquired, face flashing slightly with tired anger. It wasn't any of her business what he was doing out of bed. He had just as much right to come down to the common room in the dead of night as she had.

"Investigating the racket you're making. Now that I know it's only you and not Peeves…" The girl turned and started her way back up the staircase.

Suddenly, it Harry like a ton of bricks. If there was one single person in this school besides Hermione who could help him find Shawna, it was this girl. It was common knowledge that she'd read the library through, book by book, even the Restricted Section that one needed a special note from a teacher to get into. Hermione was sleeping but this other girl was awake… And he could really use some help going through the second book he currently had…

"Wait…" The girl, Evania, turned to look at him from the fourth stair up, her gaze unwavering and bold.

"Yes?"

"I… I'm looking for a girl…" Evania raised her eyebrow at him, and Harry was sure he detected the right corner of her mouth twitch slightly. She took two steps down the stairs, arms crossed over her chest.

"Well, isn't every straight boy over the age of thirteen?"

Harry sighed. Of all the people to have a sense of humor and of all the times to mock him, it had to be her at this late hour when he couldn't think of a witty enough response. "No, not like that. Listen, this girl turned up out of nowhere this past summer where I live and she needed help and stuff so my aunt took her in. She couldn't remember anything about herself except for facts from books and stuff like that… She couldn't even spill her name and age. But now she's back with her dad or whoever Dumbledore said picked her up and I really have to find her… because she's my friend…" He added the last bit quickly so as to make sure she didn't think it was more then friendship he was talking about, which it wasn't. He and Shawna were only friends, very good friends, but just friends all the same.

"I see. And you're telling me this why?"

"I need help. I haven't even taken a crack at this second book and I'm only halfway through the first. They've got…"

"Every witch and wizard ever born between certain five year periods. I know."

"Yeah, and I'm looking for her in these, cause she can't be too much younger or older than us… so these are our best bet. And I guess I was just…" Harry paused, hesitant to ask.

"Wondering if I'd help you?"

"Well... er… yeah." Harry watched as her expression changed to something a little less cruel. It was a pondering look which lasted about a full minute before she stepped the rest of the way down off the stairs and came over. She plopped herself down about two feet away in front of him and reached for the second book.

"Right then. I'll help, but only if you do something for me in return."

"What do you want?" Harry held his breath, hoping it wasn't something like… a date or a lock of his hair (which he had been asked for before by random girls.)

"Teach me how to produce a full fledge Patronus." Harry gave a sigh of relief. Now this was a request that would be easy. After all, he'd already managed to get the DA members to do that particular thing, and teaching one person would be a cinch compared to trying to teach twenty five individuals at once.

"I'd think you could do that already?"

"No." Evania shook her head. "All I get is silvery wisps of stuff. It's the one spell I ever have trouble with." What was it and the smart girls having trouble with their Patronuses? First Hermione, now Evania? Was it some kind of super smart brain block or what?"

"Alright then. You help me, I'll teach you."

"Great." Evania smiled then, real a true for a split second and Harry blinked. Unlike the rest of her, it was actually very pretty. It rather caught him by surprise, but he said nothing as he returned to his book.

Harry yawned as sunlight hit is face, eyes opening slightly. His head hurt… lifting it upwards a page from the book he'd been going through came up a bit before it unstuck from his cheek and fell back down into it's proper position. Blurry eyes, Harry stretched and rubbed at his eyes, making the room a bit clearer, not recognizing it for a moment until it hit him that he must have fallen asleep after all. Looking down at the book, her grabbed his bookmark and shoved it inside before slamming the book shut.

Looking around, Harry found that Evania had drifted off as well, curled up with a book under her head, her bun coming undone. Harry prodded her with his toe before he got up off the floor, taking up the book he had and setting it down on the coffee table. The girl stirred and rolled over to block out the sunlight before she sat up, rubbing at her neck. Harry bent down and picked up the book she'd been using as a pillow and placed it down on its fellow. He watched as Evania rose from the floor and headed off up the girls' stairs without a word. He yawned again and turned, going for the boys' stairs and coming face to face with a hastily put together looking Ron.

Ron blinked at him, robes askew, hair a mess, shoes untied. For a moment the two boys just stared at each other.

"What are you doing?" Harry finally got out, trying not the laugh. Looking at the clock he saw it's hands told them that it was only five in the morning. Ron usually slept until at least eight…

"I woke up and you were gone so I thought you'd just not bothered to wake me and… it's not time to get up yet is it?"

"No, sorry mate."

"Bloody hell! I got out of bed for nothing?! I could've kept dreaming about that date with.." Ron cut himself off, ears tinging red. "Well then... I guess I'll just… go back to bed then."

"Same here." Harry nodded in agreement and the pair hurried up the stairs to their dorm where they got into their respective beds and fell asleep. Harry would have liked to peruse those books some more, but he was just so tired he figured he'd be able to do it better with a good three more hours of sleep.

"Oh wake up! Wake up!" Harry moaned at the sound of Hermione's voice. "We're going to be late!" Harry felt his blankets tugged away from him and sat up as result. Slowly he made his way over to the end of his bed and kicked open his trunk to search for his robes. "Ron! Get up! Get dressed! Potions starts in fifteen minutes! Snape'll give us all detention or take points if we're late!"

"Don't get your knickers inna t-t-twist 'mione." Ron said thickly through a yawn, sliding slowly out of blinked at the name, but didn't seem to think anything of it for the moment as she chucked a set of his robes at him.

"Just hurry!" She stalked out of the room and slammed the door closed, but no more footsteps could be heard, so she was obviously waiting for them. They dressed slowly, got their teeth brushed and their hair combed (or at least Ron did) and headed out the door still a bit groggy.

"Hurry! We've only got ten minutes to get down there now."

"What 'bout breakfast?" Ron inquired.

"Here, you two missed it." Hermione shoved two napkins with three pieces of toast each at them and took off down the stairs in a rush. They followed behind her munching their toast.

"'fanks 'mione." Ron grinned, chewing happily.

Even running flat out (with random bites of toast here and there) with three shortcuts that took off about five floors of the seven-story castle, they were still running late by the time they got down to the Entrance hall. It then took them an extra five minutes to persuade Peeves that he would much rather chuck water balloons filled with doxy venom and their remaining bits of toast at Mrs. Norris, and by that time they were already three minutes late. When they finally came bursting through the door to the dungeon classroom, Snape was not at all pleased. "Well well, what a surprise. Twenty points each from Gryffindor for being ten minutes late."

"But Professor, we're only.."

"Tack your tongue to the roof of your mouth Granger." Ron opened his mouth, but Harry and Hermione both tugged at his sleeves. He shut it quickly but remained glaring. Snape leered at them and pointed to three separate tables spread out throughout the room. "You go sit with Miss Bulstrode. Weasley, with Crabbe. Potter…" Harry watched his black eyes scan the room and suddenly noticed it too. There was only one remaining seat left and it was right next to… "…go join Malfoy and Parkinson at their table. I'm sure they will make you feel more than welcome." Harry blinked. What was Snape playing at? Why go and purposely make a table crowded? The empty seat beside Evania was just waiting for someone to sit on it, so why couldn't he?

Not wanting to lose any more points though, Harry adopted a glare like Ron had and made his way grumpily over to where Malfoy and Pansy sat, stirring their cauldrons. Both turned up their noses at him. They waited until Snape had turned his back and headed for his desk at the front of the room before whispering as Harry got out his things and set them up on the table.

"Why were you late Potter? Off having a little fun with the Weasel and the Mudblood were you?"

"Shut up Malfoy."

"Of course, I've always known you were wrong in the head Potter. After all, screwing the same sex isn't natural, but I suppose you swing both ways don't you? Then again, the Mudblood doesn't look at all like a girl, so I suppose you're probably just g-"

"I said shut up!" Harry whispered at him angrily, face reddening with anger. "Shut your mouth or I swear I'm going to shut it for you!"

"With what? Your lips? That's downright disgusting Potter."

"Malfoy, if you don't…"

"Tell me though, does Granger use a dildo when she fucks you, or does she use her cock?" Harry stood up at this, knocking over both his and Malfoy's cauldrons in the process.

"Potter!" Snape rose from behind his desk and started towards them. "Sit down Potter! Thirty points from Gryffindor and a zero for the day for ruining Mister Malfoy's potion. Now what is going on here?" Snape asked as he arrived beside the table.

"Potter was sexually harassing me Professor." Malfoy spoke right up, his voice innocent, though his words were not at all truthful. "He was describing all the crude things he'd like to do to my bottom, sir, and he got angry when I told him I wouldn't do them with him because I'm not gay, sir."

"Well well well…" Snape grinned in a cold and cruel way, making Harry hate him and Malfoy all the more. "Potter, that'll be another fifty points from Gryffindor for improper actions in class, as well as detention this Saturday, eight pm, this dungeon. I will be talking to your Head of House to see if she, as I do, that maybe a month's worth of detention, or a suspension from the Quidditch Team might be more appropriate."

There was an angry uproar of noise at this suggestion. All the Gryffindors had burst out at the mention of Harry being suspended from their team. He was their seeker, and the Captain after all, their best player. There were also shouts of 'So what if he's gay!?" and others of 'Harry's not gay! Malfoy's just being a dick!" In order to regain silence, Snape raised his wand in the air and set off a noise not unlike that of a firework going off. "QUIET!" The voices faded and eyes watched anxiously as Snape strode down the aisle to the door. He pulled it open and pointed. "I want all of you Gryffindors out of my classroom right this minute. You are behaving unastonishly juvenile and I will NOT tolerate it in MY classroom. You are not to return to Potions until you have learned to be good students and not question authority."

Stunned, but not completely shocked, the Gryffindor sixth years left their seats and packed away their things, not bothering to clean up their work stations. Harry was the first one out of the room, closely followed by Dean and then Parvati. The others followed quickly and the door closed behind them. Not a word was said until they had gotten up the stairs and into the Entrance hall. Then, there was another outburst of voices.

"What an arse!"

"Dumbledore won't allow this!"

"Eh, I hated Potions anyway, was only taking it to please me mum."

"Harry, they can't suspend you from the team, they just can't!"

Harry held up his arms, trying to silence them all. It took him much less longer to achieve this than it had Snape and when he had, he spoke. "Ok listen, we don't need to worry because Hermione's right, Dumbledore would never stand for all of us being completely kicked out of Potions. McGonagall isn't likely to kick me off the team or…" Harry blinked and cut himself off for a moment as Neville raises a tentative hand. "No, I'm not gay. Malfoy was just being an arse."

"So what now? We've got a whole hour and a half until lunch." Seamus asked, looking around at all the others as though he felt they should all stick together at least until lunch.

"How 'bout we play a game of Quidditch? Five to four, Neville's ref since he doesn't like flying but isn't a bad hoverer?" Dean suggested out of nowhere. There was a murmuring of agreement to this and the groups started up the stairs to their common room.

* * *

><p>Wooooo! Sorry about that guys. I totally forgot I was revamping this one. Terrible of me really. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the chapter! Please forgive my lateness in the update. As always, I enjoy hearing what you think. Thanks!<p>

Love,

S.Q.O.


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